Favorite Part Of A Song

[Deleted]

What is it about a song that you enjoy the most or that you gravitate towards?

[H.]

Instruments, Songwriting, and Production.

[Glove Slap]

I voted for Production, but that includes Instrumentation as well because I consider that a subset of Production.

After that it's Songwriting, which includes Melody for me (also a subset of Songwriting (Melody, Harmony and Rhythm are generally the 3 main components of a fully written song or record, although you can get even more specific).

Dead last is Vocal Power cause...if your production is s**t and your song is s**t, you're better off just taking a cough drop and waiting for better material.

[dbhmr]

"Vocal power" isn't really appropriate for me, but what usually draws me into a song is the vocal performance. I can almost never handle a song that excels everywhere but has a vocal that grates on my nerves (which doesn't even always mean bad, but just not a voice or tone or whatever that works for me). However, that doesn't mean it needs to be powerful. One of my favorite voices in music right now is Lana Del Rey, and I think few utilize their voice to such grand effect.

Production would be a close second, because it also works to set the mood of a song, but also so drastically impacts my perception of the song's general quality.

If the vocal delivery and production are an A level, I'll probably enjoy the song on some level regardless of melody or lyrics, though the latter is of greater importance than melody to me.

But I'd say all of those matter for a great song. Not sure what to make of instrumentation--I don't regard certain instruments more highly than others, as long as they work for the song. I suppose someone playing instruments poorly would drastically affect my enjoyment of the song, but that seems rare.

[sabre14]

Songwriting should be lyrics looking at the other options, as "songwriting" can include lyrics, melody, instrumentation, chord progression, etc..

Even though I always gravitate to lyrics, a home run melody is pretty hard to beat and usually I can enjoy it, as long as the lyrics aren't awful.

Production's one of those things most don't notice until you hear something that's not produced right. Either too overbearing like Jimmy Wayne's "I Will" or flat out mixed poorly like Garth Brooks' "People Loving People".

[trustypepper]

Melody and production are definitely at the top of my list. Lyrics are nothing but words without those two things.

[toomuchboy]

1. Voice
2. Lyrics
3. Melody

[Deleted]

A lot of these options bleed into each other. You can have a good instrumental layout but cruddy production, but if you have great production it is almost a given that the instrumentation was on point. Songwriting - I presume you only meant words here - but when writing, you have to think about how the lyrics will best flow. So as you are going along you are probably kind of constructing the melody in your head anyway; that melody in turn will influence the words you choose (because some syllables won't 'fit' the tune in your head). And a good melody typically has a range of notes, but the more expansive the melody, the more expansive the vocal range needs to be to make it work. Vocal power could be defined a bit more - does that include range, or only refer to sheer volume? I'm assuming range is factored into that.

I guess I will go with melody, because that tends to create a chain reaction that the other things aren't able to do. Good melody -> encourages one to write good lyrics that fit the melody -> melodic lyrics inspire good production/choice of instruments to emphasize catchiness -> catchy song inspires you to find the right singer -> SMASH (hopefully)

If you start with a great melody you a) have a greater chance of hitting all the checkboxes and b) even if you don't hit all the checkboxes, the melody is so catchy that it sticks with people anyway. Don't believe me? Explain how I Don't Mind chugged its way to top 10 on airplay with zero promotion on Usher's part. And that song is dumb as hell.

[LBTrocks]

Melody got my vote. Because if you don't like the melody, it's basically impossible to like the song. At least for me it is and I would assume it's the same way for everyone else. I might be able to acknowledge that the vocal is good and that the production is on point, but I'm not going to listen to it or enjoy it if the melody isn't appealing to me.

[Glove Slap]

...but not all songs are melodic though.

[Focus]

Melody

[Flip]

I think melody, but they're all important to a song.

[icefire9]

1.) Melody (by FAR the most important for me)
2.) Production (+ Instrumentation)
3.) Songwriting
4.) Vocal Power

[irice22]

Songwriting? I'm not sure what that means. Lyrics? Melody?

[sabre14]

Mar 26, 2015 21:16:16 GMT -5 irice22 said:

Songwriting? I'm not sure what that means. Lyrics? Melody?

I'm sure zack97 meant lyrics when he put songwriting as one of the poll options.